


made of sterner stuff

by voodoochild



Series: Challenge on Infinite Earths [1]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, The Hour
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fusion, Alternate Universe - Hogwarts, Challenge on Infinite Earths, Crossover, F/M, Inter-House Unity, Post - Half-Blood Prince, Quidditch, Slytherin, Teaching
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-29
Updated: 2013-06-29
Packaged: 2017-12-16 14:42:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,612
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/863194
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/voodoochild/pseuds/voodoochild
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Slytherin House needs Lix and Randall just as much as they need Slytherin House.</p>
            </blockquote>





	made of sterner stuff

**Author's Note:**

> Written for [the Challenge on Infinite Earths](http://mizaerable.tumblr.com/post/37318772896/challenge-on-infinite-earths-is-a-30-day), Day 1 (Hogwarts). Title from a quote by William Shakespeare, “ambition should be made of sterner stuff", Julius Caesar Act III, Scene II.
> 
> Diverges from HP canon proper after “Half-Blood Prince": Slughorn dies the same night as Dumbledore; Snape gets his grand death scene, but very few people listened to the trio’s account of how heroic he was; Flitwick and Hooch died during the Battle of Hogwarts; Tonks survives and goes on to teach Defense, Lupin doesn’t. Inspired, as most of my Slytherin headcanon is, by Cathy’s gorgeous fic [the ones who were taught petrov’s defense](http://two-if-by-sea.livejournal.com/221736.html).

Lix Storm comes back to Hogwarts after the Second War for three reasons. 

First, Hogwarts has always been more of a home than anywhere she's known. Cissy has Malfoy Manor, the Potter boy has Grimmauld Place, and Storm's End - yes, hah, insert supposedly witty joke about Muggle novels here - has passed to her cousin Wyman, sodding patriarchal laws of inheritance and all. The London flat was good for a bit, but it could only be magically expanded so far and she may have committed homicide if she'd had to listen to the Garidebs having any more of their Spats, and Randall was coming down with the worst case of cabin fever she'd ever seen. They needed air to breathe, space to move, a place that could be theirs and not anyone else's.

Secondly, her husband is a known Death Eater, and it was made clear that the choice was Hogwarts, an unofficial pardon, and careful scrutiny by Aurors, or Azkaban without a trial. Not that Randall would submit to one - she knows him, he'd have dueled the entire Wizangamot to the death before letting himself be dragged through the endless remonstrating lynch mobs the post-War trials have turned into. She wants him alive, wants him with her, and she'd begged him without shame to accept the deal.

It unnerves people when she and Randall describe their marriage as one of convenience. She imagines it evokes descriptors like "passionless", and "platonic", which is so beyond ridiculous, she could laugh herself sick. It isn't that they don't love each other, and it isn't that they don't want to spend the rest of their lives together. They'd never needed to put a name to it before. 

But when the only way of keeping him out of Azkaban was a blood tie's testimony, and he didn't have any left - well, that left them few options. 

A handfasting. A white cloth. Tartan for him and the Black diamonds for her. Two plain gold bands. It was a simple matter, and she had the distinct satisfaction of walking before the Wizengamot and informing them that Mr. Brown's wife would speak on his behalf and that they would put him in Azkaban over her cold dead body. She had Dumbledore and McGonagall's stamp of support - Elektra Storm had never been a follower of the Dark Lord, and provided information on known Death Eaters at great personal risk - as well as a family name old enough to benefit her with the elder members of the Wizengamot. 

He thinks he owes her a life debt, the ridiculous man, and she can't quite talk him out of it. She didn't save him to be repaid, she saved him because she can't imagine this world without him.

Everyone knows the first two reasons. Her fellow professors tut and pat her hand and make needless platitudes assuring her she's welcome. Her students blunder into it; brash Gryffindors and too-nice Hufflepuffs and aloof Ravenclaws, stumbling up to her after dueling class and looking everywhere but at her, asking if it was true about Randall, if she really loved Hogwarts being from "that house".

That house. No one can bear to say it anymore.

And so, the third reason is because Slytherin needs her. It needs Randall, too, needs proof you can go down the dark path and find your way back, but it needs her backbone. Needs a professor who understands the shame you bring to your family when you make the "right" choices, someone whose surname was just as synonymous with the Dark Lord as Malfoy, as Lestrange.

There are barely enough first years to fill a Quidditch team, a scattering of second and third and fourth years (young enough to have hidden instead of been caught up in the fighting), and barely a handful of children over OWL level. The first student to have the Hat call out "Slytherin" - tiny Jemima Caliban, barely able to get up onto the stool without help - is greeted by boos. Hisses. A few shouts of "murderer" and "pureblood scum", never mind she's a halfblood who had barely left Brixton before coming to Hogwarts. The greeting for the next five students - four boys and another girl - only grows in vehemence.

It's the first night she holds a crying child, tries not to lie as she tells them it's not always like this (except sometimes it is). It won't be the last for a very long time.

***

No matter how hard she tries, how loudly she argues with Minerva McGonagall, there will be no Quidditch. Lix doesn't deny that Hogwarts has greater things to worry about than Quidditch, because they absolutely do. Over half the grounds are still destroyed, entire subjects without professors to teach them (Potions, Arithmancy, and Muggle Studies, among them), the number of Aurors outnumbering the teachers, most of the Gryffindors sharing dorms with the Hufflepuffs, the Ravenclaws reluctantly shoved into the dungeons with the Slytherins because both towers are still being rebuilt, Hogsmeade trips or holidays are out of the question entirely. And Lix wanted to add sporting events to the chaos?

Her answer had been simple. 

"Yes, because we need a way to forget, even for an hour or two."

Minerva had sighed, the chair in the headmistress's study nearly swallowing her small frame. She was only twenty years older than Lix herself, but there were days when she looked sixty, eighty, years her senior.

"We don't have the organization necessary. We'd need sponsors, practice time, a field that isn't half-buried under a swamp and half torn to pieces. I'm sorry, but no."

It's been years since Lix could fly, could use her agility and speed and strength for more than killing. Sometimes she wakes up in the middle of the night, her wand in hand, convinced the Death Eaters had found them. Sometimes it's Randall she fights, but he fights back. Sometimes she gets nervous because the war is over and she doesn't have to be on her guard. Sometimes she doesn't remember the war is over.

She's hardly the only one.

"The weekends are still free time, are they not?" she asks Minerva, who nods warily. "We'll have it then. I'll take responsibility. Nothing organized, no official games, or teams. Just First Level, broomsticks and and a Quaffle. You remember that, don't you Minerva?"

That sixth-year holiday in Glasgow with Randall's mum, sneaking off to the Pride of Portree match and spilling butterbeer on Minerva McGonagall. Getting roped into a pickup game, finding out that their Transfiguration professor was a dirty cheat of a Chaser, that spectacular 100-foot dive Minerva had taken for a dropped Quaffle and Lix had knocked her right off her broom with a well-placed Bludger. Randall had predictably refused to play, ended the game when he hit the Snitch with a jinx for buzzing around his ear.

Minerva fixed her with a familiar stare, usually reserved for when she and Randall had been writing in their enchanted notebooks instead of transfiguring their pencils into porcupines. "On your own head be it, Elektra."

How, she'd never known, but the word had already spread once she reached the dungeons. Rebecca Flint - former Chaser for Slytherin - cornered her before she'd even gotten past the portrait, and a chorus of voices echoed throughout the common room. Is it true? Were they allowing Quidditch? Do you think we have a chance at the Cup this year, Professor? She'd pushed her way through the cluster of Slytherins, and encountered Stephen Bradley, Juliet Davies, and Dougal McBride, the remnants of the Ravenclaw Quidditch team. 

"Is it true, Professor?" Dougal asked. "Can we play?"

Two years later, McBride would play Seeker for Portree, crediting the rebuilt Quidditch program at Hogwarts under Elektra Storm.

***

Ravenclaw has never been a violent house, so when sixth-year Slytherin Prefect Viridia Pucey wakes her and Randall one night with news that there is a fight going on in the common room, she nearly can't believe it. There are comments, certainly, snide whispers and hisses from those boys and girls in blue robes who hold themselves apart from the few green-robed students they share the dungeons with. They're not Gryffindors, they don't hex each other in the corridors, and she accio's her dressing gown from the wardrobe and shakes Randall again while Viridia turns her back. There's no privacy at this school any longer, not in Slytherin, where the walls have been charmed against "betrayal" (or whatever the Ministry's calling it this week) and the Aurors are quicker to suspect wrongdoing if there's a student named Nott, Flint, Malfoy, in the vicinity.

She runs up the stairs to the common room, leaving Randall swearing under his breath and looking for his shoes. Viridia tells her it was Zimmerman and Nedry, Ravenclaw third-years, picking on Jemima Caliban and Bridget Flint that started it, backed them into a corner and Jemima had lashed out at Zimmerman with a hex. They still can't figure out what she'd used, and Lix hopes Randall catches up with them soon. She has her wand out, because some nights, the threat is bigger than a couple of children squabbling, and she instructs Viridia to stay with her. If the Aurors are bothered - that's what they call it, "bothered", because were it any other House causing the disturbance, they'd be "proactive" - there will be more trouble.

Luckily, her presence causes most of the fighting to stop, one or two hexes bouncing off the walls and dissipating at a flick of her wand. "If I've been dragged out of bed for a childish spat, I'll hex _all_ of you and sort you out later. Am I understood?"

There are tear-stained faces and torn robes and a terrified-looking Jemima, crouching by Zimmerman. The boy moans in pain, not a single mark on him, but Nedry rocks back and forth next to him, hands and arms a bright red, nearly a burn. 

_"Mitigo Flagrens,"_ Randall says from behind her, barefoot and hair sticking out at all angles. The counter-curse sweeps out cool and blue from his wand over Nedry and Zimmerman, and Randall turns to her. "A first year casting a modified Flagrante? I don't know whether to award her house points or lock her in detention until she shows some bloody sense."

Seeing as Jemima looked about to burst into tears, Lix shook her head. "Not now, darling. I'll handle Mr. Zimmerman, wake Septima with the news that her bluebirds have been disrupting my sleep. Get this lot back in bed, will you?"

Septima is nearly as irritated as Lix herself at being woken, and takes over the handling of the Ravenclaw students. She sees Zimmerman down to the hospital wing, Poppy clucking under her breath like a worried mother hen, and trudges back through the castle toward the three more hours of sleep she has to look forward to before tomorrow's classes. The common room is deserted but for a tiny figure in Golden Snitch pyjamas, sitting cross-legged on the couch opposite Lix's husband. She stops in the doorway, listening to the low murmur of his voice as he answers Jemima's questions. 

"Didn't you ever manifest magic before coming here?" Randall asks.

Jemima shakes her head. "I knew Mum had it. She used to enchant her blackboards to plan out her lessons."

"She's a teacher?"

"Was." The girl's fists curl, and Lix dodges the flying lampshade. "She can't teach anymore. The war - it's hard for her to be around people. She does some video lessons they show in countries who don't speak English. Professor, I still don't understand how I did it."

Randall sketches out the motion for the curse, slowly. "These are the wand movements. Do you remember using them?" She nods. "The curse isn't dependent on an incantation. You could say anything, up to and including 'one two three four', so long as you have the motion and intent."

"I had to want to burn him?"

"You had to want to burn him alive inside his skin, and cause anyone who touched him to burn as well." He looks over his glasses at the girl, not unkindly, and Lix can see the irritation giving way. "What did he say to you?"

Her answer is simple, but it sends chills down Lix's spine. "He said they used to throw the halfbloods into the Forbidden Forest. Let them die of starvation or cold. He said I'd be lucky, because I'd die quick."

Lix can remember it happening. Can remember Cissy and Bella snickering as Sharon Fortescue cried, stumbled her way back five hours later and only when Dumbledore had found out. Can remember Randall being threatened with it, hexing his way out of an attempt fifth year. He's remembering, too, lips thinned to nonexistence and a tremor in his hands. After Miss Caliban is safely back in her bed, and they can finally settle again, Randall curls against her back, wordless and shaking. 

Nothing changes. No one will let it.

***

Slytherin professors are not beloved; they are feared, derided, occasionally respected, but never loved.

And that's fine, neither of them took these jobs out of love. Randall loves Charms work, loves imparting knowledge and ability, but is far too exacting when it comes to standards. Lix is good at dueling, and it's a crucial part of the curriculum even in this post-war time. She loves Quidditch, but she's feared on the pitch as much as she is feared on the dueling platform. They took the jobs in exchange for a safe haven, and their House understands that.

These are children who have grown to maturity under Severus Snape's dubious tutelage. Brilliant Potions master, she acknowledges, but resentful of anyone who wasn't on his level, and how could anyone be? He broke the others to build them up, favored the Slytherins shamelessly, and that's not what Slytherins need. 

They need to be taught that they are worth something to Hogwarts beyond a family name and the curse of ambition. 

They need a community, not a network of connections. 

They need consequences for their actions.

Minerva had offered Head of House to both Lix and Randall, knowing what the answer would be. Lix would be the official Head of Slytherin, Randall unofficially, because they come as a team. If they're going to have to be _in loco parentis_ for a little over a dozen misfits and outcasts, oddballs and budding monsters, they're going to do it together. 

The other professors expect them to work miracles, turn their den of snakes harmless like the ravens, badgers, and lions. They forget that lions hunt and eat the weak, badgers can fight much larger creatures to the death, and that there is little difference between a flock and a murder. They forget that it's always been three against one, and that every Slytherin learns on the first day of school that they have no allies except their own House.

So Randall tutors Jemima Caliban every evening in the Dark Arts, helping her learn control and calm. Lix sits up with Astoria Greengrass for the entire week her father and sister are on trial. They teach second-years how to mend clothing and hide bruises, celebrate birthdays with cake and butterbeer, disenchant the Howlers that certain parents send for what they perceive to be blood-traitor qualities. Their doors are always open, no matter the hour, because they understand one may want to speak under cover of darkness. They drill the Rules into their students - don't apologize for self-preservation, don't sell out your Housemates, and don't get caught if you break school rules.

The Slytherins have never asked Professors Storm and Brown what House they belonged to as students.


End file.
